


Yes, Virginia, There Is a Contingency Plan

by fathomfive



Category: Wolf 359 (Radio)
Genre: Corporate Espionage, Gen, Holidays, POV Alternating, Undercover Missions, bad times at your local oversized suburban mall
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-21
Updated: 2021-01-21
Packaged: 2021-03-12 10:21:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,389
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28883826
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fathomfive/pseuds/fathomfive
Summary: What was supposed to be a routine SI-5 mission goes very wrong - on the eve of the annual Goddard Futuristics holiday party. Improvisation follows.(Plus, favorite elves, Kepler's fake beard, reproduction seventeenth century warships, and backups of backups.)
Comments: 4
Kudos: 15





	Yes, Virginia, There Is a Contingency Plan

**Author's Note:**

> Jonathan and PunkHazard released this idea and some plot specifics into the wilds of the [w359/lssp discord](https://discord.gg/wFxaRMWRre) (come join!), and I captured it and forced it to learn demeaning tricks. you guys have my thanks but not my apologies

_Security camera #13_

_Cherrybrook Mall, 2 nd floor_

_18:21_

From his spot on the second floor mezzanine, perched at a kiosk full of sparkly phone cases, Jacobi watched the flow of shoppers on the ground level. Roving packs of teens, men stranded outside scented candle shops, people who walked in circles texting _I’m outside, where are you?_ Tinkly music drifted down from the ceiling. Everything that didn’t have a snowflake decal stuck to it had a candy cane decal stuck to it instead. The mezzanine railings were wrapped in prickly boas of fake evergreen, bristling with lights. As every jolly thing in sight strove to remind him, it was The Season.

Jacobi was not here for The Season. He was here on the job. “Still no sign of our guy,” he murmured. “We’re six minutes past the window.”

“Nothing out here either,” Maxwell said over the comm. “He said he had a shift to work right after the drop, so he’d better show. Anything on your end, sir?”

Seconds ticked by. “Major Kepler,” Maxwell tried again. “Is everything okay?”

There was a burst of hairy static on the line. “Ran into complications,” Kepler rasped. “Stand by.”

Jacobi slid down off his stool. A young couple slowed down as they approached the kiosk; he made eye contact and they veered hard in the other direction. As he reached under the counter for his kit, Kepler crackled back online in a haze of background chatter.

“The situation has changed,” he said, strangely muffled. “Our informant’s dead. Maxwell, lock up the van and get in here, I need you onsite.”

“Dead?” Maxwell said. “Did I hear that right? Major, did you seriously—”

“If it was self-defense I’ll understand, sir,” Jacobi said. “But I think this puts you on the naughty list for life.”

“Oh, for—it wasn’t me,” Kepler said impatiently. “It looks like his old employers were more serious about those NDAs than he bargained for. As if Veridian has a leg to stand on when it comes to trading proprietary data. Thankfully, the package is still here, but I had to cover—”

Another burst of static cut him off. It sounded like direct interference on the earpiece. “Aw, hey, buddy!” he continued, in a very different tone. The word that came to mind was _jolly_. “I love your Rudolph hat, it’s the spitting image. You want to come take a seat on my lap?”

Maxwell was seized by a sudden violent coughing fit. It sounded like she was in real danger of ejecting a lung. Jacobi listened to her hack enthusiastically and trail off gasping—he couldn’t muster the same energy. Whatever was left of him had traveled further, and was taking its time coming back.

“This is your first time coming to see me, huh?” Kepler was saying. “Of course I know, Santa remembers everyone. Smile so your mom can take the picture, okay?”

There was an aw-shucks character to his accent that came on strongest when he was taking pains to stretch civility over the hard frame of his contempt, and wanted you to know it. It was out in force now, but with an unfamiliar softness. Jacobi tried to blink away the black spots gathering in the corners of his vision.

“Sir,” said Maxwell thinly.

There was another burr of static, and the indistinct burble of children’s voices. “As I said,” Kepler murmured, flat and glacial. “The situation has changed.”

“So, when you said you had to cover,” Jacobi managed. “You mean you took over for him. You’re—doing the mall Santa thing.” He made himself stop there, before all the other things he wanted to say wheezed out and sent him whistling down the hallway like a rogue balloon.

“It was that or make the news in a very embarrassing way,” Kepler said.

“But you have the package?” Maxwell said.

“Oh, I have the package,” he said darkly. “I have all the packages, and the big red bag they came in. But I can’t exactly start looking for _our_ package in the middle of—oh, would you look at that. How old is she? Eight months? Ten?”

“We’ll handle extraction, sir,” Jacobi said, shouldering his kit. Who would let Kepler hold their baby? Even his threat assessment wasn’t that skewed, and he was the one with the canister of putty explosive in his backpack. “You just hang tight. Fulfill some childhood dreams or whatever.”

“I’m headed for the security room,” Maxwell said. “Jacobi, I’ll coordinate with you once I’ve got it locked down.” A pause. Then: “We’re cutting it close on time.”

“Watch the clock,” Kepler murmured. “Keep me updated. We are _not_ missing the company party.” The baby made a wet, inquisitive sound very close to his ear.

“Yessir,” Maxwell said. “I—look, I get why you had to—situational pressures, and all that. But what did you do with the—”

“Ah-ah-ah,” Kepler said, three syllables that lanced straight through Jacobi’s skull and let the air in in terrible gusts. “No peeking in the bag, okay? Santa’s gotta keep his secrets.”

Silence prevailed on the channel. The tinkly music tinkled on.

“Sir,” Jacobi said, “from the information at hand I’m drawing unavoidable conclusions, and I hate them. Please make me wrong.”

“I’m afraid I can’t do that, Mr. Jacobi,” Kepler said. “You understand the precariousness of my situation.”

“I do,” Jacobi said.

“Jesus Christ,” Maxwell said.

“He’s not going to be in time,” Kepler said. “You two have jobs to do. Get to it.”

* * *

  
  


_Security camera not in range_

_Cherrybrook Mall security room_

_18:33_

Maxwell pushed off from the desk, and the wheely chair rattled backward until it bumped up beside the minifridge. She stuck an arm down the back of the chair and felt around for the handle, then twisted in her seat to check out the offerings. Coke bottle full of water, water bottle full of something not water. Weird smoothie in a weird smoothie shaker bottle. A couple of energy drinks—she snagged one. A plastic container of peeled hard-boiled eggs.

“I’m sending an updated schematic to your phone,” she told Jacobi, kicking off the wall and rattling back to the security terminal. The chair narrowly avoided the room’s other occupant: a security guard she had introduced to her pocket taser and then, for good measure, to a roll of duct tape she’d found in a drawer. “We can get you to the utility room, but it won’t exactly be easy.”

They’d agreed that a strategically placed remote charge was the way to go: blow the mall’s power system from a distance, and make sure they were on the outside edge of the chaos by the time it erupted. The perfect conditions for a man in a very red suit to escape unnoticed.

“According to the documentation I’ve got here, it can only be opened by card keys held by the support staff,” she went on. “I don’t have the equipment to make you one or the time to bypass the reader, so you get to take the fun way in. Hope you’ve been doing your stretches.”

“Air ducts?” Jacobi said wearily.

“Air ducts,” she said. She popped the can, took a sip, and put it down immediately. It was still warm enough that you could taste it—she wasn’t that desperate yet. Maybe later, when the reality of the situation had sunk in.

On the terminal in front of her, camera #18 was recording live from the west concourse. A line of kids and parents snaked down the hall out of range, and at its head was Santa’s Winter Village. There was a towering fake tree, and rumpled sheets of white fabric, and a big plush reindeer lying with its legs folded and tinsel draped over its antlers. There was a big fabric-draped bench with an evergreen swag along the top. And most relevantly, there was Maxwell’s boss.

Kepler was not recognizable unless you were looking for him, and once you found him you regretted looking. In place of the usual hard edges and glossy confidence, he had a hat, and a big fluff of fake beard, and a lot of unconvincing pillows under his long red coat. There was an infant perched on his lap. She watched him straighten the kid's knit hat and scoot him around to face the camera.

The kid’s head did a slow heavy swivel of admiration, fixed on Kepler’s face. Kepler scooted the kid around again. The head turned ponderously. Kepler scooted a little more. The head kept turning. The whole kid went sideways and Kepler caught him under the arms. “Whoops-a-daisy!” he said. Maxwell horked her energy drink up her nose and started coughing again.

Since joining SI-5, she had become pretty well acquainted with those days where the job defied all logic, but you put the feelings in a box and you did what you had to, and then later you went home and turned off all the lights and screamed facedown into the couch. Sometimes it was Jacobi's couch and he said “Ew, don't get snot on my cushions,” and then walked off and came back with takeout menus and a box of tissues. Today felt like one of those days, except instead of screaming it was going to be a kind of seizing hyena laughter that went on until she got cramps. She was sort of looking forward to it, for the novelty.

“I’ve got the map,” Jacobi said. “I’m heading for the nearest access point. Maxwell, am I clear?”

She turned hastily to the relevant camera feed. Jacobi was deep in the current of shoppers on the ground floor, trudging behind an elderly couple. She watched him sidestep left, get cut off, sidestep right, and narrowly avoid putting his foot through the legs of the old lady’s walker. He pulled up short, swung wide, and was promptly clipped by a double stroller.

“Clear through the food court,” she said, ignoring his grumbling. “After that—oh, great.”

“What now?” he said.

“We need a backup route,” she said. “The north concourse is way too crowded, I see a lot of security guards.” Onscreen, she saw him check his phone.

“There’s vent access in a couple of the department stores,” he said. “Assuming this map is accurate. I’m gonna get arrested twice as fast, you get that, right?”

“Only if you behave suspiciously,” Maxwell told him.

“Oh, well,” he said. “Then I guess it’s fine.”

  
  


* * *

  
  


_Security camera #18_

_Cherrybrook Mall, Santa's Winter Village_

_18:_ _39_

Two skinny boys in matching scarves shuffled toward Kepler and stopped about a foot away. They had the sullen rabbit twitchiness of kids who knew their mom was standing right behind them with a camera, and would rather cut off their little fingers than acknowledge her. Admirable, if misguided—it was already too late for them, unless they were prepared to take drastic measures. Kepler patted the bench on either side of him. He knew all about doing things you did not want to do. He wasn't going to bother with sympathy, but he understood.

He also knew about getting people to do what you wanted without saying anything. It was all in the eyes. He looked at the kids, very pointedly, and after a few reluctant seconds they shuffled over and sat down.

“So, boys,” he said cheerfully—they both cringed, it was gratifying when you could get that effect right off the bat—“Why don’t you tell me what you’re looking forward to on Christmas?”

“We know you’re not Santa,” said the kid on his right. “Your eyebrows are the wrong color.”

“Uh, no? We know you’re not Santa ‘cause Santa’s fake?” said the kid on his left in a hassled rush.

“Yeah, because Santa’s fake,” said the kid on his right, recovering. “Obviously.”

“You’ve got sharp eyes, huh?” Kepler said. “Just out of curiosity, if I’m not Santa, who do you all think I am?”

“Some dude,” said the left-hand kid scathingly.

“Just some guy,” said the right-hand kid smugly.

“Is that so!” said Kepler. A moment. “Is that _so_.”

The kids blanched. He leaned down between them. “In any other instance I’d applaud your skepticism,” he said, lowering his voice. “There are a lot of fake things in this world. Corn futures. Famous people. Rule of law. Highly flammable reproduction seventeenth century warships—now, hah! _That’s_ a story. But,” he dropped a hand on each of their shoulders, and gave them a little shake. “Rest assured, _I am not one of them_.”

Soothing silence resulted. Kepler smiled behind his beard. He hadn’t worked with kids since that stint undercover as a guitar teacher back in ‘03, but it was like field-stripping a carbine: you never forgot.

The left-hand kid turned his head haltingly, bug-eyed. “Can we hear about the warships,” he said.

“You know,” Kepler said, “since you remind me of my two favorite elves, I’d love to tell you all about it.”

  
  


* * *

  
  


_Security camera #6_

_Cherrybrook Mall, Sears_

_18:4_ _1_

Jacobi was winding through the appliance section of Sears when something beeped shrilly in his ear. He’d just determined that it wasn’t his phone when Maxwell swore under her breath, and the beep cut off.

“So,” she said. She gave it a few extra syllables, as if hoping to put some distance between herself and whatever she was going to say next. “We have another problem. The clock just ran out. We’re not going to make it to the party in time.”

Abruptly Jacobi felt himself filled with good tidings of comfort and joy. “Oh, _no_ ,” he said. “Huge pity, but sometimes you gotta make sacrifices for the job, and I really do want to make sure we do our best work here. They’ll miss us, but it can’t be helped. Maybe next year.”

“Sometimes there’s just nothing you can do,” she agreed, mournful and very nearly convincing. “The operation comes first, of course.”

On the other end of the line, amid the kid chatter and the world’s longest instrumental holiday medley, Kepler cleared his throat. Jacobi’s good cheer crystallized and began to crack.

“Nice try,” Kepler said. “Maxwell, find me a loophole. Do whatever you have to. We’re moving the timetable up.”

“Oh, come on,” Jacobi said. “Last year we stayed at that party for four whole hours. If that doesn’t earn us the right to pass, what does?”

“Nothing!” Kepler said brightly. “It is not a right you have access to. Maybe we can’t get there on time, but we _ar_ _e_ getting there.” He paused. “You don’t know what it’s like when you miss the Secret Santa exchange. Mr. Cutter takes it personally.”

Jacobi tried to imagine Cutter taking something personally. From her silence, Maxwell was doing the same.

“Well,” she said slowly, “I did base my estimate on the assumption that we’d be splitting to go home and get ready. If we went straight to the party from here, we might still make it.”

“ _Maxwell_ ,” Jacobi said.

“Then that’s what we’ll do,” Kepler said. “Thank you, Doctor.”

“I’m wearing a little vest and a button that says ‘ask me about custom printed phone cases,’” Jacobi said. “And you’re wearing—what you’re wearing.”

“And we,” Kepler said, “are in a mall. We will make do. Secondary objective: everybody finds something acceptable to wear to the party. Jacobi, I’ll text you my measurements. No ties thinner than two and three-quarter inches. No prints visible from more than five paces. Get moving.”

Jacobi got moving. Sears was a theoretically infinite space, the dread geometries of the houseware and electronics sections unfolding like a fractal from inside women’s casual and women’s athletic and women’s formal and women’s outerwear. He went up and down several escalators and finally burst through a winter prom display into menswear, which was dominated by a huge wall ad of a man in a dark red suit. He was grinning a golden grin, and pouring a glass of golden whiskey. He was probably really handsome, but they’d cut out the top of his head to make room for the MEN’S CHANGING ROOM sign.

There was no one at the attendant’s station, unless he was hiding behind the racks of discarded clothing. Jacobi rifled through the nearest rack and paused on a navy suit jacket and matching tie. The price wasn’t too bad. He scooped them up and carried them down the aisle between the stalls, until he found the one he was looking for. He hung the clothes up, locked the door, and climbed onto the bench to peer into the air duct.

“I’m in position,” he said. “Let me know if anyone gets too close.” He swung his bag onto his chest and felt around for his multitool.

“You’re clear for the moment,” Maxwell told him. “Target location is approximately sixty feet northwest. Two rights, a left, and another right. Also, hey, I made an online order at that Sears, can you pick it up on your way out?”

“Yeah, sure,” he said. “Anything else? A smoothie?”

“I have a smoothie.” His earpiece pinged, and a moment later she said, “This is a private channel, it’s just the two of us. Try and meet me here once you’re done, okay? I have a _great_ view of Santa’s Winter Village.”

“Yeah, yeah, rub it in,” he said. “Please tell me you’re saving the footage.”

“Who do you think I am?” she said. “Even if we have to go to that stupid party, we’re getting our consolation prize.”

“Has he made any kids cry yet?”

“Surprisingly, no,” she said. “He’s, uh. Just sort of talking to them? They seem to like it.”

“Typical,” he said in disgust. “Let me know if one of them tries to pull the beard off.”

“We can only hope,” she said.

  
  


* * *

  
  


_Security camera not in range_

_Cherrybrook Mall security room_

_19:_ _10_

Jacobi complained all the way through the duct, which was how Maxwell knew he was feeling confident. When he made it to the utilities room he went silent, though, that particular dead quiet that always fell over him when he was absorbed in his work. She turned back to Santa’s Winter Village, where Kepler was trying to coax a toddler out from behind the bench. The line of Santa fans seemed as long as ever, and traffic slowed and bunched on the concourse as people moved by. She sat forward in her seat.

“Major,” she said slowly, “I think we’ve got a bite. Your eight o’clock, next to the pretzel stand.”

Kepler made a wordless noise of acknowledgment, holding out his hands for the reluctant toddler. He didn’t so much as twitch in the direction she’d indicated. Maxwell studied the figure who’d caught her attention.

“White woman, late thirties or early forties,” she said. “Blond hair, puffer coat, a fleece headband.” In that sense she looked like pretty much every other woman in camera range. But unlike them, she had the patient, bored-but-alert posture common to soldiers and good private security: people used to standing around for long stretches of time, waiting for the brief bursts of violence they got paid for. Her spot by the pretzel stand gave her partial cover from Kepler’s eyeline. She was watching him very closely.

Kepler retrieved the kid and settled himself on the bench. He leaned down, and, under the guise of whispering in the kid’s ear, said, “Tell me if she jumps when I do this.” He leaned further, and reached into Santa’s sack.

Behind him, the woman at the pretzel stand tensed up and took two steps left into full cover. Her hand moved toward one of the big shopping bags at her side, then withdrew. Kepler took a shiny envelope from the sack and handed it to the kid. “That’s for your dad over there,” he said, nodding over the rope barrier. “Ten dollars off any Sears purchase, sir.”

“That’s our killer,” Maxwell said. “Got to be. She really didn’t like you going into that bag.”

“I’m safe as long as I stay here,” Kepler said. “I want her out of the picture by the time we’re ready to move.”

“Device is set,” Jacobi cut in, his voice echoing. He must have been back in the duct. “Remote detonator is receiving. I can take care of her, sir. I have an idea.”

“Keep it clean,” Kepler said. “We’ll follow your lead. I—yes, of course it’s my real beard. Yes, I do wash it every day. Ketchup is a real problem.”

Jacobi snickered, then went silent with the swiftness of a prey animal in the underbrush. Maxwell, applying what her thesis adviser had called her “agile and frankly daunting intellect,” kept her mouth shut.

“Status on the secondary objective,” Kepler said coolly.

“Working on it, sir,” she said, just as Jacobi said, “Well, I’m _trying_. You can’t say I’m not trying.”

“Oh, trying!” Kepler said. “You’ve definitely been in there long enough to have started trying. But given that this is an important night, and situational pressures aren't getting any less pressing, I need to see progress.”

Jacobi started to speak, and then embarked on a string of percussive sneezes. “Once I get out of here I’ll duck into the JC Penney,” he said thickly. “I think I saw a sale sign.”

“JC Penney? I still need shoes,” Maxwell said. “Seven and a half wide—you mind? Okay, great, thanks! You’re the best.”

Jacobi muttered something that told her he wasn’t properly appreciating her appreciation. “It’s okay to be shy,” Kepler said. “You don’t have to sit with me if you don’t want to. Why don’t you sit with Rudolph instead?” Somewhere on his end a baby was crying.

“Flat shoes,” Maxwell said. “ _Flat_ , Daniel. No heels.”

When Jacobi turned up on camera again he was so dusty he looked like an afterimage, and he was leaving footprints. He made his Sears purchases, got briefly lost amid the patio furniture on the way out, and ended up in the JC Penney, combing through the racks under a salesman’s suspicious gaze. Maxwell kept half an eye on him and half on the #18 camera feed. As the crowd thickened the blond woman had shifted position. Now she was lurking just inside the entrance of a clothing store, behind a cardboard cutout of a shirtless man in low-slung jeans. Someone had draped his chiseled torso in tinsel, for a festive touch.

“Can—can you just tell me if this is on sale or not,” Jacobi was saying. “No, I get that. I don’t have the card. I know it’s ‘select purchases.’ _Is this one of the select ones_.” Muttering. More muttering. “With the pocket square?” he said. “I guess. Okay, thanks.”

The silence on Kepler’s end acquired a particular boiling quality that meant he had heard the words “pocket square” and was only holding back because someone had handed him another baby. He had once told Maxwell a very long and complicated story about an embassy heist planned via the complex pocket square code used by covert agents. She didn’t remember anything else about it except that it had started with “now, that reminds me...” and ended when she’d passed out from a merciful hit of field-administered anesthetic.

“I’m almost done here,” Jacobi said. “I have to change before someone sics mall security on me. Maxwell, what’s our friend up to?”

“She’s holding position,” Maxwell told him. “I’ll add a marker to your map.”

Jacobi was a long time in the bathroom. He came out wearing a dark suit that was actually quite tasteful, and a loosened skinny tie that efficiently destroyed any notion that the tastefulness was on purpose. She watched him head past the blond woman and the shirtless cardboard guy, vanish into the store, and reappear on the #20 camera feed, feigning interest in monogrammed polo shirts. After about ten minutes, he slipped back into the stream of shoppers leaving through the security gates.

As he passed the blond woman, one of his shopping bags slid from his grip and he doubled over to catch it. Then he straightened up and kept moving. From there he looped through the food court and headed into a bookstore. She saw him flag down an employee and show the man something on his phone.

A knot of motion on another screen caught her eye: the storefront where he had brushed by the killer. Three mall cops and several employees had converged on the entrance, just outside the security gates. The blond woman stood in the middle, gesturing angrily.

“You planted something in her bag, didn’t you?” she said. “What was it?”

“Scrap wire and tools, some leftover Semtex, and the most expensive cologne I could find,” Jacobi said. “Shame to let those wire strippers go, but you gotta do what you gotta do.”

He left the bookstore, dipped into a menswear outlet, and started heading for the east concourse. She tracked his progress on the backs of cameras 12 through 16, and opened the door to the security room a second before he knocked. He sloped inside with a huff of relief and set his shopping bags down in the unconscious security guard’s lap.

“You want an energy drink?” she said. “Maybe a hard-boiled egg?”

“Caffeine,” he said. “ _Please_.”

When she turned away from the fridge, can in hand, his attention was on the #18 camera feed. He had the rapt expression of someone who knew that they were witnessing one of the world’s rare and chancy wonders, like a solar eclipse or a rat pulling a whole untouched bagel out of the trash. She understood.

“...managed to leave the radar array intact, but it was a close thing,” Kepler was saying, to the kids seated in a semicircle at his feet. “Long story short, when a situation goes sideways—and it will!— _you_ stay consistent. Maintain situational awareness. Avoid emotional displays. And don’t complain.”

“Why—” a kid began.

“I’m telling you why,” Kepler said.

“I don’t think that’s how the song goes,” Maxwell said. Kepler made a dismissive gesture at the camera.

Jacobi tore his gaze from the screen and took a long swig of his energy drink. Like her, he knew that wonders didn’t last. “I’ll keep an eye out while you change,” he said. “It’s time we wrapped this up.”

  
  


* * *

  
  


The detonation was anticlimactic, which Jacobi argued was the point. “It’s precision work,” he said, as the lights overhead stuttered and went out, and took the tinkly music with them. A couple people yelped, and there was a metallic clatter somewhere off in the dark. “There’s a time and a place for drama, but sometimes this is what you want.”

They were forty feet from the mall’s eastern exit, walking fast and dressed, if not to kill, than at least to inconvenience. Maxwell felt inconvenienced. She hiked her dress up for the fourth time, and fell into step with Jacobi as he tucked the remote detonator into his new suit jacket. Nothing was tinkling or sparkling or jingling anymore. He looked happier than he had all night.

People were circling and calling out and shining their phone flashlights into each other’s faces. Uneasy mutters were building in the dark, bodies drifting unseen toward the exits. Overhead, something went _wh-chunk_ and the fire sprinklers came on to a chorus of shouts and curses. They sped up, and burst out the door into the chilly parking lot.

Kepler met them at the van. He cut a weird silhouette in the dark, bearded and hatted and hauling Santa’s sack behind him on a little red wagon. He’d ditched the padding, and the big red coat flapped around him like a cloak. He had the tight expression of someone who was clinging to dignity by his teeth, and was aware that clinging defeated the purpose.

Jacobi and Maxwell stared down at the sack. “Help me get him into the trunk,” Kepler said. Maxwell tilted her head. If you were looking, you could make out the knees.

While Jacobi and Kepler stowed their bad cargo, Maxwell started the van and got into the back. Kepler joined her there, and Jacobi took the wheel. “Last chance to make the mercy call, sir,” he said. “In fact, consider it my Christmas wish. We could go get Chinese food.”

“Christmas wishes are for good children,” Kepler said. “And last year your argument leaned very heavily on being Jewish. Drive.”

They peeled out and hit the main road. Maxwell hadn’t bothered to buckle, and now she climbed into the rear of the van and started digging wrapped presents out of the sack. Kepler reached into the shopping bag Jacobi had brought him. The first thing he took out was the suit jacket.

“Jacobi,” he said.

“Major,” Jacobi said. He kept his eyes on the road.

“The color is borderline,” Kepler said. “In fact, that’s generous. The color is this close to initiating hostilities in enemy territory.”

“It’s, you know, oxblood?” Jacobi said. “Oxblood.”

“It is absolutely not oxblood.”

“It’s not that bad,” Jacobi said. “I mean, I’d wear it.” Maxwell caught his eye in the rearview and grimaced.

“That is only the first of my objections,” Kepler said, swiftly and with prejudice. He seemed ready to list the others—Jacobi half hoped he would, just to get the violence out of his system. But instead he set the jacket aside and peered into the bag, with the five-hundred yard stare of someone who didn’t have the will for the full thousand. That was worrying. Jacobi stepped on the gas.

Maxwell had been ripping through presents like a spoiled kid on a mission. By the time Kepler accepted his fate and began changing, she sat in a drift of wrecked wrapping paper, her feet buried in stuffed animals and remote-controlled cars. As Jacobi put them on the highway she gave a shout of triumph, holding up a palm-sized drive with a bit of sparkly ribbon still stuck to it.

Kepler leaned in, buttoning his new shirt while she plugged the drive into her backup tablet. Filenames began to populate the screen, and he made a satisfied noise. “Good,” he said. “Good. We can call tonight a seven out of ten. We’re going to need a replacement asset at Veridian if we want to make it worthwhile, but that’s a problem for next year.” He unwrapped the pocket square from its tissue and held it to the light for several long moments. “Not bad,” he said grudgingly. “For a synthetic blend, at least.”

“Are we ditching Santa now or later?” Jacobi said. “I have to pick an exit.”

“Later,” Kepler said. “The restaurant has private parking, he’ll keep. Jacobi, did you find the book I asked for?”

“It’s in that stripy bag under the seat,” Jacobi said. “They wrapped it for me, so you’re all set for the gift exchange. Please don’t ask me to buy you a self-help book ever again, okay?”

“Self-help book?” Maxwell said. “Oh, wait, you have Wilson, don’t you? I thought we were okay with Marketing after last quarter.”

“We’re just fine with Marketing,” Kepler said, folding his pocket square. “But past choices still have consequences. I thought he could use a little reminder.”

“ _Say Yes To Now_ ,” Jacobi intoned. “ _Ten Brave Steps Toward Owning the Life You Live_.”

“One more thing,” Kepler said, tucking his pocket square into place. “Your copy of the security footage, Maxwell.”

“Wh—copy?” she said. “I didn’t—I mean, I definitely wouldn’t—”

Kepler put out a hand. “Maxwell.” His tone was tolerant, but warned of intolerance incoming at high speed.

“It’s mission intelligence,” she said. “I have a right to that.”

He met her gaze, cool and sharp. “And I have a right to designate it need-to-know.”

He had spent most of the last hour hefting other people’s children around and saying things like “You’ll find out on Christmas Day!” His usual calm had calcified into something chilly and brittle, and Maxwell did not want to know what she’d find underneath when it cracked all the way off. She inched a flash drive out of her bag and handed it over. Kepler tucked it into his jacket and said, “and the backup.”

She gave him the backup. “And the cloud copy,” he said. “I want to watch you transfer it to my personal server, right now.”

She made a face but followed through, holding her tablet up for him like a kindergarten teacher at storytime. “ _Thank_ you,” he said. “I appreciate your diligence, Doctor.”

They pulled up at this year’s party venue at 20:13. It was a restaurant so excruciatingly fashionable that Jacobi and Maxwell had both seen it in magazines and vowed never to try to pronounce the name out loud. They piled out onto the pavement, and Kepler tilted his head back to read the glowing sign. His hand twitched briefly toward his tie, then dropped. Jacobi and Maxwell watched this with fascination.

“I guess this place is right up your alley, huh?” Jacobi ventured. “Have you been here before?”

“It’s been Michelin-starred since 1957,” Kepler said distantly. “I had hoped the first time would be under different circumstances.” He gave his head a brief shake and strode forward.

The hostess who met them inside looked harried: she seemed to sag a little in relief when they presented themselves. She hustled them past the dining room, down an atmospheric and badly lit hallway, and into a little vestibule crowded with bags and coats. From the far side of the polished double doors, there were voices and faint laughter. Kepler’s hand went for his tie again. He caught himself at the last second, and opened the doors.

The function room was an assault of light: the chandelier, the electric candles, the real fire in the fireplace. The world’s longest instrumental holiday medley was back for an encore, piano and bells spilling tinnily from hidden speakers. When they stepped inside, curious gazes hit them like a spray of buckshot and stuck there.

Jacobi adjusted his posture into a slouch that was devil-may-care but not too devil-may-care. Maxwell hiked up her dress. Kepler, all in red, hove forward like a highly flammable reproduction seventeenth century warship, and they bobbed along in his wake.

Mr. Cutter met them in the middle of the room. He raised his glass to them, and stretched his grin until his long white canines caught the light. “You made it!” he said, which meant _T_ _hank your lucky stars you made it_. “Happy holidays!”

“I apologize for our lateness,” Kepler said. “There were situational pressures.”

“Oh, no worries, no worries at all,” Cutter said, waving a hand. “Everything went well in the end, I hope?” His gaze lingered on Kepler. His eyebrows pulled inward briefly.

“Of course,” Kepler said, like a man who had never been forced to wear a polyester beard. “It’s taken care of.” He did not mention the contents of the van.

“I’m glad to hear it,” Cutter said, beaming. His smile gelled and set, chilly and transparent, and he leaned in. “Warren,” he went on, in a fine imitation of human concern, “I can’t quite put my finger on it, but you don’t seem like yourself tonight. Is something wrong?”

Kepler stiffened a little more, which hadn’t seemed possible a second ago. He tugged at the lapel of his suit jacket. “Off-the-rack,” he said.

Cutter’s expression collapsed into sympathy. “ _Oh_ ,” he said. “Warren, Warren. Say no more. Why don’t you go get a drink.”

Jacobi and Maxwell watched Kepler’s face in their periphery. It didn’t give away anything resembling an emotion, but they knew him well enough to tell that he was at the point in the evening where you either bent or snapped.

“Yes,” he said slowly. “Maybe I will. It’s been a busy day.”

“Go and take a load off!” Cutter said. “I’ll see you at the gift exchange.”

Kepler’s head swung toward the bar at the west end of the room. He turned back toward Jacobi and Maxwell, nodded briefly, and then made for the alcohol.

“You know,” Cutter confided, while they were still casting about for an exit strategy, “I was really worried for a second there! Warren’s devotion to duty is one of his best qualities, but I would have been _so_ disappointed if anybody had missed the Secret Santa. It’s just not the same without the whole gang in attendance. And I _hate_ taking punitive action during the holidays.”

“Yeah,” Jacobi said, this seeming like the safest option.

“Of course,” Maxwell said, because Jacobi had already claimed “yeah.”

“It won’t be long now,” Cutter said. “Why don’t you two go mingle a little first? It sounds like you’ve more than earned it. Daniel,” he said, uncurling a finger from the stem of his glass and pointing at Jacobi, “You’ll be happy to know we’ve got a great cheese plate this year.”

“That’s great, sir,” Jacobi said. “We’d love to go. Go and mingle. Thanks very much.”

“Thanks very much,” Maxwell echoed, backing away. Cutter gave them a cheery wave, and, mercifully, aimed his grin in another direction.

“I genuinely think he could ruin the cheeses for me,” Jacobi muttered as they beat their retreat. “He could do it.”

“Lucky for you,” Maxwell said, rummaging in her bag, “I have a pick-me-up.”

“If you had a handle of tequila or a big rock in there you could have told me earlier,” he said as they headed for the buffet. “Man. It’s like you don’t even care.”

“Daniel,” she said solemnly, “never say I don’t have your back.” She pushed a slightly smashed box into his hands. It had been stripped of its wrapping paper and then re-crowned with a lopsided bow.

“‘KidSnapz My First Digital Camera,’” he read. “Uh. Thanks?”

“I picked it out special for you,” she said smugly.

“You’re gonna have to—look, am I missing a joke?” he said. “‘4GB storage for your fun photos!’ Seriously? I didn’t get you anything.”

“The memory card’s included,” she said. He took another look. The tape had been picked away and carefully replaced.

“Oh my god is this it,” he hissed, clutching the box to his chest.

“Last backup,” she whispered. “I thought we could do a movie night.”

“ _Thank you_.”

“Happy holidays,” she said.

**Author's Note:**

> happy holidays! (yeah I know it's January)


End file.
